A 346 million-peso, no-bid maize contract for Minsa, owned by Sheinbaum’s advisor, was canceled but left sharp ethical questions.
When a state food agency awarded a 346 million peso contract to Minsa earlier this year, it looked like another big win for one of Mexico’s dominant maize flour producers. What made it different was who stands behind the company. Minsa belongs to the family of Altagracia Gómez Sierra, a prominent business leader who now advises President Claudia Sheinbaum on economic policy and heads her Council for Regional Economic Development and Relocation.
The deal was awarded directly, not through an open tender. Alimentación para el Bienestar–Diconsa, the state entity that inherited Segalmex’s functions, asked Minsa Industrial to mill up to 60,000 tons of maize already stored in government warehouses. The company would turn the grain into nixtamalized flour, pack it in 20-kilo sacks and distribute it to 61 warehouses in 13 states. The flour was destined for tortilla producers in about 3,500 mostly rural, often Indigenous communities, under the “Maíz para Todos” component of the federal rural supply program.
Under the contract, signed in March and scheduled to run until the end of December 2025, Diconsa provided the maize and paid only for the processing, packaging and logistics. Internal price comparisons show Minsa quoted between 5,200 and 8,200 pesos per ton of flour, far below what competitors usually charge when they must also supply the grain. Officials argue the lower price justified skipping a full tender and proceeding by direct award.
How the maize contract was built
Diconsa invited four major maize-flour suppliers to participate in a market study. One large rival offered only its standard product made from its own grain at around 13,500 pesos per ton. Another wanted the state to haul tens of thousands of tons of maize to a distant private warehouse. Only Minsa put forward an integrated proposal that matched the agency’s plan: remove grain from state silos, mill it into house-brand flour and deliver it into the rural store network. With no comparable offer on the table, Minsa became the de facto winner.
On paper, the company was already a familiar actor. Between 2022 and 2024 it received 853 separate contracts from Segalmex–Diconsa worth a combined 369 million pesos, mostly for smaller flour purchases to stock community stores. In 2025, aside from the large maize-processing deal, public procurement data show at least 190 additional federal contracts for Minsa, adding a little more than 183 million pesos. The company and officials describe these agreements as routine supply deals in a market it has served for decades.
Minsa is not a small player. It is one of the country’s big two nixtamalized maize-flour producers and reports billions of pesos in annual sales, with plants and grain-handling infrastructure across Mexico. Company filings emphasize that sales to government entities have actually shrunk as a share of total revenue, from about 7.8 percent in 2020 to just over 4 percent this year. In its view, the controversial contract was another piece of ordinary business in a sector where state programs and private suppliers overlap every day.
That argument lands in a sensitive institutional context. Diconsa and its predecessor structure have been under fire after civil society investigators documented a pattern of irregular direct awards to little-known firms, often with fictitious or misleading addresses. One investigation tracked nearly two billion pesos in contracts to a tight circle of suppliers that auditors later linked through shared fronts, fake competition and alleged identity theft. None of those findings involves Minsa, but they have left the agency’s contracting decisions under a harsh spotlight.
The maize-processing deal with Minsa never actually moved grain. According to a notice the company sent to the stock exchange, Diconsa and Minsa signed an early termination agreement in July. No maize was processed, no flour was produced and the firm reports that it did not receive a single peso under the contract. Officials say demand for house-brand flour was lower than expected, and the grain inventory earmarked for the project was redirected to other parts of the rural supply program.
Sheinbaum advisor contracts under scrutiny
Even without money changing hands, Sheinbaum advisor contracts have become a political headache. The size of the award, the lack of a formal tender and the family link between Minsa and a senior presidential advisor created the perception that access to power mattered as much as price.
Gómez Sierra sits at the center of that debate. At 32, she chairs Minsa’s board, helps run a broader conglomerate of industrial and financial firms and leads the presidential council tasked with building bridges between the government and private investors. She built that profile over years inside her family’s businesses, moving from media monitoring jobs as a teenager to senior roles in logistics and finance. Her supporters frame her as a symbol of a new generation of women in Mexican business and politics.
The presidency insists there is no conflict of interest. In a recent morning news conference, Sheinbaum said the contract was canceled months ago and stressed that Gómez’s advisory role is unpaid. The advisor, the president added, helps attract investment and will not participate in public contracting processes during this administration, aside from the limited role played by large flour companies that already sell to the state. Agriculture officials have also stated that the maize contract ended before any public funds were spent.
The facts leave a narrow, uncomfortable gap. On the one hand, documents show a legally permissible, price-competitive contract that never generated revenue for the company involved. On the other hand, they show a large direct award to the family firm of an influential presidential advisor, within an agency still trying to shake off a reputation for sloppy and sometimes corrupt procurement.
For a government elected on promises to clean up public life, that gap matters. The episode around Minsa and Diconsa may fade quickly now that the contract is gone. Yet it has already sharpened the question of how this administration will handle business ties inside the president’s inner circle, and how far it is willing to go to prove that social programs built on cheap tortillas and rural stores are truly insulated from political favoritism.
